It's The End Of The World As We Know It (And I Smell Pine)

The effects of human-induced climate change are being felt in every corner of the United States, scientists reported Tuesday, with water growing scarcer in dry regions, torrential rains increasing in wet regions, heat waves becoming more common and more severe, wildfires growing worse, and forests dying under assault from heat-loving insects.
Yep, heat-loving insects. Here's what they'll look like:

If you're smart, you're making plans, and as a graduate of a state university who broke a thousand on his SATs (but only after taking an intensive prep course) you can bet I'm dealing with this problem head-on. (Always wear your helment when dealing with problems head-on.) Here's how:

First, I've moved my family to higher ground and onto the mainland so that I can watch and laugh from the parapet as the other four boroughs are swallowed up by the sea.

Second, climate change means extreme weather such as massive blizzards in winter, baronial rainstorms in spring, scorching heat in summer, and flesh-eating locusts in autumn. For this reason, I now seize every single fair-weather opportunity to fuck off for a bike ride, because there aren't going to be too many left.

In other words, if I check my phone and see this, I drop whatever it is I'm doing and grab the nearest bike:

Unless what I'm doing is eating a sandwich, in which case first I finish eating the sandwich, and then I take a nap if the sandwich made me sleepy.

Third, I'm raising my seventeen (17) children to flourish in a post-apocalyptic wasteland ravaged by heat-loving insects in which antibiotics are useless and toxic floodwaters lap at our ankles, forcing us ever inland until we're all huddled for survival atop the Continental Divide like those US Airways passengers who landed in the Hudson.

Unfortunately, I haven't quite figured out how to raise them for survival, especially given the increasing disparity between rich and poor. Basically, I'm torn. Part of me thinks I need to groom them to make billions of dollars and join the ruling elite, and part of me thinks I need to train them to hunt and kill and scavenge and use weapons and be resourceful so that they thrive as rebel soldiers in the inevitable class war.

Then I realize I have no idea how to make billions of dollars or be resourceful on an elemental level, so instead I just placate them with juice boxes and Netflix.

In the meantime, I try to console myself with the fact that people who are smarter, got higher SAT scores, and went to better colleges than me are hard at work averting the destruction of the Earth and building a better future, and indeed the key to our survival can be summed up in two words:

Sure, car-dependence is highly impractical, uses a shitload of resources, and contributes to the totally ass-tarded city planning you find in 99% of the United States, but maybe if the computers are driving the cars it will all work out, right? Yeah, that's the ticket! All we really need to sort out now is who they run over in the EXTREMELY UNLIKELY event that anything goes wrong:

The problem is starkly highlighted by the next scenario, also discussed by Noah Goodall, a research scientist at the Virginia Center for Transportation Innovation and Research. Again, imagine that an autonomous car is facing an imminent crash. It could select one of two targets to swerve into: either a motorcyclist who is wearing a helmet, or a motorcyclist who is not. What’s the right way to program the car?

Hey, awesome, it's "Sophie's Choice" on wheels!

Here's an idea: instead of having the car decide whether to run over the kid on the tricycle or the woman pushing a stroller, why not just make the car fucking implode? That way, the only victim is the driver. It's time we brought a little nautical honor to the roadways here in Canada's udder. The captain should always be ready to go down with the ship, even if that ship is a Prius running on the Android operating system and the voyage is a run to the Whole Foods in Gowanus--which should be swept out to sea any day now.

Of course, there are people who are working on alternatives to the robot car, like this bunch of brainiacs who have invented a recumbent sperm mobile:

Amazing. I've always yearned for the sensation of being buried alive while traveling to the store to buy absolutely nothing because of the complete lack of cargo space. Not sure how useful this contraption is for, well, anything really, but I'd sure love to see some good YouTube video of the typical Walmart customer trying to squeeze into one.

If only there were some sort of machine that was relatively inexpensive, required no fossil fuels, carried cargo, posed virtually no threat to other road users, and could travel for miles at a time under human power:

Now that's TMBDFOT! (Too Much Bike Dork For One Train.) About the only thing missing is a GoPro manssiere. (Though I suspect the guy on the right simply hasn't slipped his on yet.)

Speaking of trains, some sort of tandem conveyance with space for hundreds of passengers running on a dedicated roadway between the suburbs and the city center could make for a safer and more efficient alternative to the robot car.

Kenny, I don't know about this art, but there's a good chance that the anticipation of the art is better than the art itself. On the other hand, maybe the art prize that is unfulfilled is performance art in itself. Or Snob has important pre-apocalyptic riding to do.

From this wonderful quote (modern child rearing in a sentence) to the neologism of "manssiere" for a GoPro, you're on fire today, Snob. And these gems, nay diamonds, are what keep me coming back, and even make me geek out by sprinting for the virtual finish line with the other geeks!

Loving the early posts since here in Pacific Time it allows me to get my procrastination in BEFORE I even do a lick of work.

Snobz you should build a dock. For when the other 4 boroughs are inundated. YOU'LL BE RIAAATCH!

Robot cars - yes let's cede even more autonomy to the ROBOTS. Have we learnt(*) nothing from Hal, Skynet, etc.? Bad enough the traffic lights are controlled by robots. That always bothered me. And I'm supposed to obey it like it's a real cop.

Excellent today, Wildcat.Here in the Midwest, we will fry, drown, freeze and have the locust issue, but we do already. I guess it'll just be more so. There is a survivalist store in the next county I may visit soon. Portable solar cell generators, medical kits, MRE's and......bicycles.

Hey! As a dedicated apocaloptimist, I fuck off and go for a bike ride every chance I get, too, Snobberdooderdoo. Rain or shine. 'Cept today. And tomorrow. Cause I want my legs to have lots of go in them on Saturday... :)

My two favorite websites besides this are Clusterfuck Nation and Nature Bats Last. This post was like a combination of the two combined with biking! I'm feeling surprisingly optimistic for a change today.

As someone else mentioned, I can't believe Snobby is giving attention to something as insignificant and inconsequential as runaway global warming when the tragic and unnecessary deaths of the Bengazi attack are still fresh on the minds of everyone. How can our children feel safe about their future when the security of American Embassies in obscure Muslim countries is only a passing concern.

The IPCC should be banished and converted to the IBCC; International Bengazi Conspiracy Council.

Wo ! Lots of political stuffs in the Snoboverse today! So complex too. Used to be that all political comments exchanges went like this: -Obama is a marxist.-George Bush is a war criminal.-Ron Paul.

Now we have to really believe that a few Escalades and child labor camps in China are changing the temps outside and forcing hordes of helpless hapless people off their flooded island paradises to get eaten by ubiquitous polar bears.

Now we have to actually take up pitchforks to deal with this "income inequality" thing. (seems like trying to do something about gravity or the instantaneous failure mode of crabon... some stuff just IS // I guess that depends on what the meaning of the word IS is).

I think the robot cars will transcend us all, just like Johnny Depp in the movie. The Toyota Pius of the future will definitely have us all licked, one soft target helmentless rider at a time.

I looked outside and said Fuck it I'm taking the train. I don't trust the analog automobiles that I own.

Nothing will go wrong with autonomous cars, we have solid expertise from Microsoft and Apple maps. The only difference is that the MS blue screen of death will now be literal, and you will need an app to drive through the window of a Dunkin Donuts/Tim Hortons*.

Raining here in nyc today, had to take the subway. I had a minor altercation with someone who accidentally reverse frottaged me, and not in a good way. the person opted to stand against me, as if I were a wall, rather than next to me, where there was much more room. I got a little annoyed and asked him to move, it escalated slightly and everyone looked at me like I was insane I hate rainy days.

JB - Oh dear. You reminded me of an uncomfortable situation which has reared it's one-eyed head again. It happened just before the first son hit puberty, too.

There comes a day when the boys' friends stop looking at me as the bearer of snacks, video games, rules and curfews, and instead start giving me the "sexy once over." And I just want to laugh, cause they're BABIES, but that's not kind, so instead I pretend not to notice.

Averaged 20MPH on the ride home from work last night. I was smiling, not because I magically became fast, but because of the wicked(-aawsome) tail wind. I may have my fredly tendencies, but I'm smart enough to know and enjoy when mother nature is being kind.

Who said anything about it being 'an example of how to properly carry bikes on a train'? If you weren't American you would've recognised the ironing.

Speaking of the decline and fall of the American Empire, what you want for your post-apocalypse ride is a tall bike because zombies never look up (they just stare straight ahead and make gurgling noises). So they'll never see atop your tall bike!

Fred of the Sea:Brilliant. Comment of the Day for me.Given the choice between a 21 year old and a woman of a certain age, I'll always take the older and wiser.Although I have been happily married for decades, if I were to have to start over, my rule would be that the lady would need to able to name the past three presidents.

The Rob Fords 'Redemption Story' shall come to fruition and he will rise up again, sort of like Jesus did, and become once again the New Messiah of Toronto. Amen. The Lord and the voters of The Windy City work in mysterious ways.

Even if McPherson is wrong about the methane hydrates I still think his time frame will prove to be correct. Just slightly increasing overall temperature will drastically increase land temperature which will have implications which we won't be prepared for; most likely a series of airborne pathogen events. The rising sea levels will be the least of our worries, I doubt many will be around to see that part. But I like the idea of Snobby on the tallbike with flotation pontoons behind the seat and around the handlebars. With 17 trailing children on child-specific flotation-capable tall bikes, like a family of ducks.

But in all seriousness, I think the ideal bike for the remaining future will be a steel road bike with Schwalbe Marathon plus 700x25 tires and a European bottom bracket. I just don't think the BB30 system is climate-apocalypse-ready. You are just gonna want something fast and reliable that won't break down in a crash. Being on a cargo bike will simply make you an easy target, so just load up your Soloman backpack instead.

Wish I did! Brilliant idea. I do, however, know where you can get your hands on a film in which cars poop out 19lbs of CO2 for every gallon of gas they burn. And yes, it's on kickstarter...https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1983721999/worse-than-poop

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About Me

While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!